Someone had better quickly tell John Lloyd and Jack Straw, the Home Secretary, that a parent's marital status does indeed matter ("How the left hijacked the family", 27 November).

Research shows that children from separated families are more likely than children from intact families to grow up in households with lower incomes, poorer housing and greater financial hardship. They also tend to achieve less in socio-economic terms when they become adults, and are at increased risk of behavioural problems, delinquency and other anti-social behaviour. Moreover, they are less likely to perform well at school, and more likely to become sexually active at an early age, give birth outside marriage, and report more depressive symptoms and drug use.

Admittedly these disadvantages apply only to a minority whose parents have separated, and it cannot be assumed that parental separation is the underlying cause, but children of separated parents are about twice as likely to experience these poorer outcomes in the long term compared with those from intact families.

Francis McGlone
London SW19

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